The Six Best Super Bowl Parties in NFL History

The NFL Super Bowl is the culmination of one of the most popular sports in America. In addition to becoming a major national sporting event, the Super Bowl has become a dream come true for the party scene in the host city.

We’re not talking about your run-of-the-mill parties where a few friends gather together to have some drinks and watch the game.

These parties are full-scale galas, designed to be one of the biggest entertainment venues of the year. It’s true: The number of Super Bowl parties each year is surpassed only by the number of New Years Eve parties.

As we wind up for yet another Super Bowl season full of big parties, let’s take a moment to reminisce about some of the best Super Bowl parties in history.

Pepsi Co. After Super Bowl I, 1966

The first Super Bowl took place in the Los Angeles Coliseum in January of 1967. Pepsi Co. big-wig Samuel Dresch and his wife brought two private planes full of their closest friends to watch the game.

After the Green Bay Packers had capped off their season by beating the Kansas City Chiefs, the Dresch party converged upon Perino’s on Wilshire Blvd with two private planes full of their closest friends. There they ate, drank, and made merry in celebration.

Miami Ex-Players Celebrate Perfect Season, 1972

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When the Miami Dolphins had become the first (and only) team in history to execute a perfect season including the Super Bowl, there were certainly many wild parties in Florida.

Perhaps the bestparty of the year; however, was a small group of former Dolphins' players who gathered together to share a bottle of champagne in a celebratory drink. Included in the intimate group were Bob Griese, Nick Buoniconti, and Dick Anderson.

It was a quiet and perhaps fitting conclusion to cap an amazing season by their former team.

Madden Bowl XV, 2009

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Staged as an eight-player tournament to determine the best Madden player in the NFL, the Madden Bowl has become a Super Bowl tradition.

On the Thursday before Super Bowl XLIII in Tampa Bay, players from around the NFL gathered to compete. Antonio Bryant may have come away the victor in the tournament, but the real winners were everyone who stayed for the after party.

When the games were done, Joel Madden of Good Charlotte put together a shindig that was the toast of the town at the Honey Pot club. Even T.O. ditched his own party to go hang out with his NFL brethren.

Raiders Team Party, 1981

One of the greatest types of Super Bowls is the kind where there’s a true underdog that manages to come out on top, despite the odds against them.

Such was the Super Bowl in 1981 between the Oakland Raiders and the Philadelphia Eagles, where the underdog Raiders came away with a 27-10 win.

This was a team comprised of the misfits of the NFL. This was during the era when the players of the Oakland Raiders were widely seen as the halfway house of the league—a team populated by thugs and miscreants.

In this case, the party wasn’t about the glitz and the glam, but about the team coming together to accomplish the unlikely. The members of the Raiders were bussed off to a team facility where they and their families were able to celebrate their unexpected victory with snacks, music and plenty of champagne.

Playboy Super Bowl Party 2005

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Since 2001, Playboy, Sports Illustrated and Maxim have a bit of a competition to see who can throw the best party.

In 2005, Playboy edged out the competition in Jacksonville, FL to throw the best bash. Playboy threw its traditional celebrity-packed party, complete with Playmates to keep things a bit spicy. They even had body paint on hand for anyone that needed an extra dash of fun.

There was a bit of an uproar involved with a certain politician who was caught in attendance with all of the scantily-clad women, but what kind of big gala is complete without a small scandal?